Centrifugal separation of blood into components of different specific gravities, such as red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, and plasma is known from U.S. Pat. No. 5,707,331 (Wells). The apparatus shown in that patent employs a disposable processing tube having two chambers, and blood to be separated into components is placed in one of the chambers. The processing tube is placed in a centrifuge, which subjects the blood to centrifugal forces to separate the components. The supernatant is then automatically decanted into the second of the chambers.
To retain, principally, the red blood cells during the decant of the supernatant, the apparatus disclosed in the Wells patent includes a shelf placed in the first chamber at the expected level of the interface between the red blood cells and the less-dense components, including the plasma. One problem with the arrangement shown in the '331 Wells patent, however, is that the position of the interface varies with the particular proportions of the components (e.g., the hematocrit) of the blood to be processed. Thus, if the shelf is placed at the expected position of the interface for blood of average hematocrit, and the hematocrit of the particular blood being processed is low, the shelf will be above the interface after separation. Such a position of the shelf will hinder the flow of the components near the interface during decanting, thus retaining significant amounts of these components in the first chamber and reducing the separation efficiency of the system.